


A Better Version of Me

by Gorgeous Nerd (gorgeousnerd)



Category: Fringe
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon, F/M, Season/Series 04
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-04
Updated: 2012-04-04
Packaged: 2017-11-03 01:02:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/375337
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gorgeousnerd/pseuds/Gorgeous%20Nerd
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Peter Bishop and the terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad universe.  (Season 4 AU.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Better Version of Me

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this right before 4x16 aired, but I didn't post this until after I watched it, so there might be some spoilers through there flavoring the story. Also on [DW](http://firmament.dreamwidth.org/51296.html) and [LJ](http://chomalfoyfics.livejournal.com/60244.html).

Disappearing from existence doesn't feel like much. A blink of the eye, a little fuzz and blurring of the people around...

...and a lot of water.

Peter splutters and pushes above the surface, heart pounding. As he gasps for breath and takes in the lake and its surroundings, he can only think one thing.

_It'll only get better than this._

-

Except.

"Who are you?" Olivia demands, gun pointed directly at Peter's chest.

As he raises his hands and glances around the rest of the Harvard hallway to make sure there aren't any other weapons pointed at him, Peter laughs a little. It's not funny, and he doesn't disbelieve that Olivia doesn't remember him. If anything, he believes it way too much.

At Olivia's elbow, Lincoln frowns and shifts his own gun. "Answer the question."

"Peter." When Olivia doesn't react - of course she doesn't - he adds, "Bishop."

Olivia blanches. But she's a professional, so she schools her features and says, "On your knees. Now."

Peter goes and lets her handcuff his hands behind his back. It's not exactly the tearful reunion he'd hoped for.

-

"Astral! Move to the left!" The camera shifts as a heavy sigh hits the speakers, and Peter winces as a large, gory wound fills Walter's screen. 

He's handcuffed again today - after two breakouts from the holding cell in the Fringe Division, Olivia didn't trust him out of anyone's sight - but really, they didn't need to bother. This is where he wanted to be, and he's here. No running now.

Besides, the way Lincoln's hand keeps twitching toward his gun is more than enough deterrent.

"There!" Walter takes the licorice out of his mouth and points at the screen. "You can see the incision would fit a scalpel perfectly. You'll have them--"

"Bring it back to the lab," Astrid finishes immediately. "They're already standing by."

"Then no need to waste time! Peter, I believe I left the camera at home. Could you get it?"

"No, it's..." Peter says automatically. He pauses as Lincoln looks between the two of them, frowning with confusion. "It's on the top shelf in the office."

"I..." Walter turns, face soft and shaking. He sucks in a small gasp, and he looks determined as he walks his way inside the office. (Or, as it's called in this universe, Walter's bedroom.) After a few minutes of clattering noises, Walter comes out, camera in hand.

"I remember taking pictures of my genitalia with this," Walter says wonderingly. "And you asked me to put on a robe long enough for you to make dinner."

"But I thought you said he wasn't your son." This comes from Lincoln, who sounds incredibly confused.

Peter grins. He gets it now. "I wasn't. But I am."

-

The world goes fuzzy whenever Olivia's in the room.

It's not Peter being romantic; it's basic fact. Basic fact that no one else can see, not until Olivia remembers him and kisses him again for the first time and things go almost entirely black. It's only the feel of Olivia's lips on Peter's that keeps him from losing it entirely, but when she draws back, everything's in focus again.

"Did you see that?" he gasps, rocking a little.

Olivia's pale. "Let's go talk to Walter."

By this point, Peter's walking in the lab with his hands loose and without Lincoln as his shadow. It's night, and Walter's listening to records, but he straightens when he sees them approach.

"Have your camera ready," Olivia says, and at Walter's knowing expression, Peter shakes his head.

"Not like that."

"Well." Walter's not phased. He sets the camera to record video, and Olivia leans in for another kiss.

It's the same as last time, but with a humming sound. Did Peter just not notice before? Shouldn't it be a ripping or tearing noise, like things are pulling apart? Instead, it sounds like a machine whirring, louder and louder...

"Oh my."

Olivia's pulled back, and Walter's staring at Peter like he just kicked his puppy. Or his vinyl collection. No, definitely vinyl, with the way Walter's treated animals before.

When they play back the footage, and Peter sees nothing but himself blurring out of existence, he gets where Walter's coming from.

-

"We'll find an answer," Olivia says. She's standing a good distance away from Peter in front of his house. Or what his house used to be. In this reality, the furniture is covered in dust cloths, and it's strange in a way it hasn't been for years.

The air's still blurring at the edge of Peter's vision, but he doesn't want it to stop. Not if it means Olivia's leaving.

But she drives away, and Peter's left alone. Or so he thinks, until something moves out of the corner of his eye.

He doesn't need to look straight on to know it's an Observer.

-

Following the Observers is easier said than done. Particularly since he can't take Olivia's help, not until he's firmly set in the universe and not at any risk of blowing it up.

But Peter knows what to look for, and he has patience, so days later, he's standing in front of the Beacon and ready to see what they have to say about what's going on.

Of course the Observer he thinks of as Walter's appears in the beam of light in front of him. Even if things are a special level of weird, there's still some kind of order out there.

"You are not a part of this universe," he tells Peter, voice as light as it always is. "You were never supposed to be here, and the machine rectified that mistake."

 _My mistake_ , Peter hears, even though the Observer doesn't say it.

"But they remember me," Peter says. "Olivia remembers me. Doesn't that mean anything?"

"It means they will remember you when you are gone." The Observer puts his hat on. "But you are not meant to be with her. You never were."

"Isn't there anything I can do?"

The Observer tilts his head, and before speaking, Peter knows he won't like his answer.

-

"What did he say?" Olivia's voice in his cell phone is full of static, lacking any of the richness that Peter loves so much.

Peter smiles at her from across the field. There's a part in the clouds, and the kids in the park are taking advantage, running and screaming like their lives depend on it. Maybe they do.

"He gave me two options."

"What were they?"

"The first was to run through the machine again. But he wasn't sure the universe would survive, so that one's out, obviously."

"And the other?"

Peter says, "Stay there," and hangs up the phone.

Olivia's body is tight with tension as he crosses the field, but it's harder to see the further forward he gets. For a second, he isn't sure he'll make it, the humming getting louder and louder, but Olivia catches him before he falls, and she's there, more there than anything.

"What are you doing?" she asks softly.

He kisses her again, and the humming's so loud he can't hear anything else. He tries to dig his fingers in her jacket, but they pass through nothing.

That's it, then.

"Fixing things," he whispers, and just before everything's dark, he wonders if she heard him.

-

Olivia finds the camera in Peter's old house two days after he disappears in her arms, complete with a newly recorded message. Maybe she should wait for Walter, but he's been tearing through the lab in a way she's never seen.

She hits play.

"Hey, Olivia." Peter's sitting on the chair she's sitting in, rubbing his hands together. "I wasn't sure I'd get everything across to you before I took the plunge, so here it is."

He pauses and takes a breath, and Olivia inhales, too.

"I'm not disappearing when I'm close to you. The universe is trying to fix things, and from what the Observer said, I'll be fixed, too. I won't be Peter Bishop anymore. I won't remember anything, and I'll have different parents, a different life. But we'll be able to be next to each other. We'll be able to be in the same place."

Peter rubs his face. "Here's the important part. I'll remember you. I'll remember everything, but you need to find me again, wherever I am. It's a long shot, but it can happen. And it's all up to you. If you want to do it."

He reaches for the camera, and Olivia swallows. But he pauses and says, "I love you, Olivia. I know it's probably pretty obvious, but I'm already risking enough on maybes. That shouldn't be something I leave to chance."

The screen goes dark.

-

Astrid drops her mug on the table. It lands upright, but some coffee sloshes over the side. She doesn't seem to notice. "Are you serious?"

Olivia nods, rubbing her face. "I can choose whether to find this guy that's like Peter and put Peter over him, or I can leave him to his new life."

"Wow." Astrid nods a couple of times while she processes it. "I wouldn't know what to pick."

"Me neither." Olivia laughs a little. "Why should I be the one to choose?"

Astrid shrugs. "Because he did it for you?"

"But I'm not the only person in his life. I'm not the center of his entire universe." She waves a hand. "And what about these new memories? Are they any less because they technically didn't exist a couple days ago? Peter didn't exist a few weeks ago, either."

It's still confusing, crowding in her brain. She sees her life with Nina, the ways she survived, but she also sees the alternate memories, completely different and yet so similar. What would she do? Would she pick Peter over Nina, over this Astrid, over this Walter?

Astrid shifts on her feet and looks back toward the office. Walter's room. "Are you going to tell him?"

"I..." Olivia bites her lip. "I don't know."

Astrid looks at the camera in Olivia's hand, and back at Olivia. "I told him I'd wake him up around now. If you want to talk to him."

"Oh."

Astrid waits for a second, but when Olivia doesn't answer, she slips toward the back.

Olivia raises the camera in her hand. It would be so easy to hit delete, to let Walter think that Peter was just...gone. And then, if Walter or Astrid or even Lincoln ran into Peter on the street, it wouldn't be in her hands.

But then, should this be in her hands now? She wanted Peter, _her_ Peter, so much it ached, but was that a good way to decide? What about...

She drew up straight.

What about Walter? The single most important person in Peter's life, the only reason the adult version of him existed in the first place? Shouldn't he have some kind of say?

She looks from the camera to Walter's room. 

It's a bad decision, cheating, when she knows what the answer will be. But it's the only decision she can make.

Olivia sets the camera on the table without deleting the message, and she walks toward the main door without a second glance backward.


End file.
